Home Invasion In Springs Poem by Gert Strydom

Masked like the black criminals
that robs you of your car
and just there and there promises you death,
they arrived

with a mini bus taxi on the farm,
drove right through the farm gate
and at the front door
jumped out of the kombi

with five steps intruded into the house
to bring death to the farmer,
to rape the wife
and daughter.

The farmer heard the crash
at the gate,
he realized that it was big trouble
heard them in their own language command

to kill, while shot upon shot
was ringing from the front porch
and he though about the obliteration
of his whole family.

His wife was too far away
in the lounge busy with sewing
and he heard his daughter rushing screaming
to her mother

turned about hurried to the gun safe
and got hold of a pump action shotgun
with LG cartridges
and rushed down the hallway.

In the lounge four black criminals
aimed pistols at his daughter and wife
told them to strip themselves bare
and when they did not want to

one said to the others in his language
to kill them
while the farmer was sneaking
closer at the back of the lounge suite.

Just one glance from the farmer
made his wife and daughter fall to the ground
two shots came from the shotgun
lifting two of the gangsters right from their feet

and the other two started shooting
into the ceiling
and the wall of the lounge
and when the farmer fired again

they fled in fear to the outside
turning around to fire at the farmer
and another one dropped in his tracks,
the other ran wounded into the cornfield.

At the start the police, wanted to arrest
the farmer for the murder of the robbers,
but there was more than enough evidence
that it was self-defence,

even the farm workers
were witnesses
about the shooting, threat
of the robbers

and by his actions
the farmer saved himself, his wife and daughter
and the labourers praised him
as a kind and a just man

but at the church
some members regarded the farmer
as a mass killer
who had determined the fate of others with a shotgun.